Sequenza21/

I’ve been working so hard today I’ve forgotten to eat, and it’s in that spirit of lightheadedness and poor impulse control that I share with you the following San Francisco Bay Area new music scene update.

The Lab’s 25th anniversary performance series is well underway, and in just one night, they’ll run the gamut of styles celebrating their audacious artistic vision.  On Thursday, July 2nd, Mills College’s own Chris Brown will curate and perform in a concert featuring Charles Johnson, Chad and Curtis McKinney, Tom Nunn and William Winant.

When Johnson et. al. take the stage, you’ll hear amplified string and percussion instruments tuned in just intonation, combined with analog electronics configured to create difference tones.  Chad and Curtis McKinney are twin brothers whose SuperCollider-based computer network music makes a tightly interwoven, visceral and strongly rhythmic combo. Chris Brown will put on his electroacoustic hat, teaming up with instrument inventor Tom Nunn to tangle with legendary percussionist William Winant.

If you can’ t make it this week, never fear, since the series will continue next week with Miya Masaoka and Tomas Phillips on Thursday, July 9th, and a multimedia event the next night with Nao Bustamante, Margaret Tedesco, and Cliff Hengst.  Performance artist Bustamante will embody 1940s Dominican movie starlet Maria Montez, using video and the body as a source of backdrop, narrative, and emotion, taking audiences on a journey all over the body and its bejeweled parts.

The Lab is conveniently located at 2948 16th Street, San Francisco, near the 16th and Mission BART station.  They’ll let you in for $8.00 at the door. For more information, call (415) 864-8855.

The San Francisco Bay Area  has a unique way of celebrating the first day of summer.  Our most popular new music event, the Garden of Memory, comes around every summer solstice, and reliably attracts more than 1,000 visitors while creating a parking nightmare for miles in every direction.  In 2007 I was forced, like many attendees, to park in the nearby cemetery and accidentally backed over the curb.  I left my car there and hurried away apologizing profusely for actually driving over somebody’s grave.

Every year over 30 composers, improvisers, and sound-artists take over the columbarium at the Chapel of the Chimes, located at 4499 Piedmont Avenue in Oakland. The concert takes place on the summer solstice regardless of the day it falls on, and this year it’s Sunday, June 21st, starting at 5:00 p.m. and continuing until 9:00 p.m. or sundown, whichever comes first.

The first time I attended the Garden of Memory concert was also the first year I participated, though I wasn’t on the list of lucky featured performers.  In 2003 my friend Christi Denton was assigned a space in the columbarium, as all participating artists are, for her multi-speaker sound installation.  Recordings of me playing flute multiphonics, and giving a tarot card reading, were among those she looped for the installation, whose speakers hung above a collection of ferns in one of the columbarium spaces, like the fruit of a robot tree, filling the room with the disembodied voices and music of women.

Few new music events in this or any city are as family-friendly, visually stunning and sonically varied.  If you plan to spend your Sunday evening in the Garden of Memory, public transit is recommended.  Admission is $15.00 general, $10.00 for students and seniors, and $5.00 for kids under 12 (kids under 5 are free). Tickets are available at the door, or in advance from www.brownpapertickets.com.

San Francisco is famous for its innovations, its open minds, and its spirit of protest.  In 2005, according to Rova Saxophone Quartet member Larry Ochs, “our government was committing all sorts of crimes against humanity in all of our names. I wanted to create some art that flew in the face of those acts – but not overtly political because that’s not what we do.”

Rova dreamed up an international collaborative work in honor of the visionary genius of Buckminster Fuller and his “Spaceship Earth” global perspective.  “Good works by people brought together from different countries – if only to point out that it was possible for people to meet for the very first time and in a week of collaboration, create something positive for the spirit, and something that was more than any one of the collaborators could create on his/her own,” Ochs explains.  Berlin-based multimedia artist Lillevan, Swedish-born percussionist Kjell Nordeson, Canadian contrabassist Lisle Ellis, cellist and Kronos Quartet alumna Joan Jeanrenaud, and violinist rock star Carla Kihlstedt make up the international dream team that will join Rova in presenting Fissures, Fixtures: for Buckminster Fuller.

The set of pieces combines live music and digital animation in a continuous feedback loop, with the music influencing the creation of the film in real time, and the film images inspiring the music.  Improvisation, as Larry Ochs declares, will ensure that the piece transcends the individuals involved and becomes more than the sum of its parts.  Rova and friends offer up the piece to honor “someone who over 40 years ago was stating categorically that mankind had to find a way to work together to create a one world-system that benefitted everyone.”

Since both performances will be recorded for future DVD release, this is your chance to immortalize your own applause for contemporary music posterity.  The concert happens twice, on May 22 and 23 in Kanbar Hall at the Jewish Community Center of San Francisco located at 3200 California Street.  Tickets are $24.00 general, $21.00 for JCCSF members, and $16.00 for students.  Get them online at www.jccsf.org, and by phone at (415) 292-1233.

We’ve reached the final concert of Interpretations’ twentieth season of provocative programming in New York City! Founded and curated by baritone Thomas Buckner in 1989, Interpretations focuses on the relationship between contemporary composers from both jazz and classical backgrounds and their interpreters, whether the composers themselves or performers who specialize in new music. To celebrate, Jerry Bowles has invited the artists involved in this season’s concerts to blog about their Interpretations experiences. Our last concert is also an anniversary celebration: The String Trio of New York has been going strong for 31 years. Guitarist James Emery and bassist John Lindberg have invited some of the most innovative jazz violinists to work with them: Billy Bang, Regina Carter, Diane Monroe, and Charles Burnham. Since 2001, violinist Rob Thomas has more than ably filled those shoes. While the trio has had many works written for them, and does perform the “classics” of jazz, this concert will feature the music of Emery and Lindberg. John Lindberg explains in his own words, below. We hope to see you at Roulette this Thursday, 23 April and stay tuned for next season.

This particular concert of the String Trio of New York, now 31 years running, is a unique opportunity to present a retrospective of works that have in some ways defined the development of the group, and highlights its diverse repertoire. My three pieces on the program — The Anticipator (1987), Nature,Time, Patience (2001), Journey Platz (2007) represent different side of my mucical personality as a composer, and extremely varied approaches to the collective utilization of the improvising and interprational talents of the trio members, in effect being a voyage through the time/space continnum of the s3ny, while offering up renditions that lie solidly “in the moment” that they are being performed.

Interpretations has been, in my view, the most vital and compelling series for creative music in New York city for some two decades, due to its great breadth of music it presents, and remaining one of he very few ongoing series that offer composers free reign to present their music as they wish it to be presented.

It is with great pleasure I have another opportunity, with this landmark concert for the trio, to perform as part of the Interpretations series.

The String Trio of New York performs at Roulette on Thursday 23 April at 8pm.

The String Trio of New York

Interpretations

Roulette

Interpretations continues its twentieth season of provocative programming in New York City. Founded and curated by baritone Thomas Buckner in 1989, Interpretations focuses on the relationship between contemporary composers from both jazz and classical backgrounds and their interpreters, whether the composers themselves or performers who specialize in new music. To celebrate, Jerry Bowles has invited the artists involved in this season’s concerts to blog about their Interpretations experiences. The concert on 12 March 2009 is a recital by the producer himself, baritone Thomas Buckner. He took time out of his busy schedule to tell us in his own words about the series and his concert on it:

On Thursday March 12, the Interpretations series continues its twentieth season. As the series founder and artistic director, I am grateful to Sequenza 21 for featuring our series. The series was founded to nurture community of new music composers and their interpreters. Sequenza 21 nurtures our community by allowing us to communicate with one another.

I am often asked what draws me to the music I present and perform. An answer I have often given is that, whereas many people can make music that sounds like music, I am interested on people who make music that sounds like them. It is a criterion well met by the music I have chosen to present in my concert of new music for voice. Each or the composers is a true original.

The first half of the concert will feature an extended work written for me by composer/pianist “Blue” Gene Tyranny, whom I got to know through our work in the operas of Robert Ashley. The piece, “Somewhere Songs”, has an original text by the composer and is for voice and electronically reproduced sounds. The three songs concern friendship in extraordinary circumstances and are “based on true stories about hidden places, depicted physically, psychologically and socially in specific word idioms.” There is a natural musicality and a sense of mystery in these songs. They have been released on a recent CD of “Blue”s music on the mutable music label.

The next piece in the concert, “T-Language”, made by Tom Hamilton and me, is an improvisation for voice and electronics. We have sought to give the work a clear identity by using recorded vocal improvisations to shape the electronic sounds. Tom and I have worked together for years, and this piece has been developing really well. Our previous recordings include Tom’s “Off Hour Wait State” and our collaboratively created “Jump the Circle, Jump the Line.”

The concert ends with “Beats”, composed by Stuart Saunders Smith for me and my long time collaborator, pianist Joseph Kubera. The texts are from Jack Kerouac and Walt Whitman. It is not a song cycle. Rather, the texts are spoken with piano accompaniment, and the voice sings wordlessly. The music is extremely complex rhythmically. A friend of mine characterized one of Stuart’s pieces as sounding like Roscoe Mitchell, Mallachai Favors and Lester Bowie improvising, but exactly notated. This music is challenging and enjoyable to perform and listen to. It also requires us both to play percussion and has a theatrical flair characteristic of Stuart’s music.

Those of you who have seen the publicity for this concert know that I was also to perform a work by Fred Ho for baritone saxophone and baritone voice. Fred has been waging a courageous war against cancer. He is doing very well, but is presently indisposed, so we will perform his work in a future season.

I hope you will join us at this concert and at the remaining concerts in our twentieth season.

Thomas Buckner is in recital at Roulette on Thursday 12 March. For more information:
Interpretations
Roulette

What better way to ring in the year than to take in a couple ensembles, from opposite ends of the spectrum, showing in much the same way what the whole point of playing is?

Wojciech Kilar is a Polish composer from the same 60′s group that gave us Penderecki and Gorecki, but is notable for his detour into film music (Like Coppola’s Dracula). This is his utterly simple/hard 1988 piece Orawa (there are a bunch of other video performances of this on YouTube, but this one with Agnieszka Duczmal conducting the Chamber Orchestra “Amadeus” has them all beat for pacing and enthusiasm. Just ignore that couple-second blast of other music at the start):

For all his jazz-lite leanings, David Sanborn (with Hal Willner’s savvy music coordination) has always had my eternal gratitude for hosting one of the most phenomenal major-network music offerings, NBC’s Night Music, which ran between 1988 and 1990. Not least for this wonderful clip of Sun Ra and the Arkestra taking us all to a higher plane:

Two really different approaches perhaps, but both seem to work some of the same ground and head to the same place in the end. May what we attempt in the coming year get lucky enough to find that place too, at least once or twice…

This Fall marks the twentieth season of provocative programming in New York City brought to you by Interpretations. Founded and curated by baritone Thomas Buckner in 1989, Interpretations focuses on the relationship between contemporary composers from both jazz and classical backgrounds and their interpreters, whether the composers themselves or performers who specialize in new music. To celebrate, Jerry Bowles has invited the artists involved in this season’s concerts to blog about their Interpretations experiences. Our fourth concert this season, on 20 November, features composer-performers JB Floyd and Raphael Mostel at Roulette.

JB Floyd:
My concert on the Interpretations Series on November 20th will mark the third time that I have presented my compositions on this prestigious series. These concerts have featured my works for flute and piano, vocal pieces for Thomas Buckner and the Yamaha Disklavier™ and keyboard works that combine the unique features of the Yamaha Disklavier™ as a concert piano and as a controller keyboard.

Though my music is mostly notated there are usually opportunities for improvisation within each composition. Having worked on many occasions with Thomas Buckner I am particularly looking forward to our work together on a new piece of mine, In Crossing The Busy Street for baritone voice and Yamaha Disklavier™. The poem is by Daniel Abdal-Hayy Moore a poet whose works inspire musical representation.

Other compositions are for the Yamaha Disklavier™ and will be performed by my talented protégé, Liana Pailodze who is an Artist Diploma candidate at the Frost School of Music at the University of Miami. It is an honor to be included on this celebrated series that is celebrating its 20^th Anniversary.

Raphael Mostel:
Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Bela
I am haunted by Bela Bartok. He composed certain musical ideas which pursue me, and unbidden keep coming back to mind. My Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Bela is an attempt to exorcise this musical “possession” using one particularly searing turn from Bartok’s Piano Sonata. I’ve enlisted help from John Cage, Morton Feldman, Leonard Bernstein, Gyorgy Kurtag and many others. Wallace Stevens’ poem seemed to bless this exorcism. My apologies to triskadecaphobes.

A Letter to Benoit Mandelbrot, or, Authenticity
I’d written to Benoit Mandelbrot, the father of fractal geometry, asking if he’d never wondered why — since visual representations of fractals are so beautiful — the supposed musical representations of fractals are not? I offered to explicate mathematically. He wrote back inviting elaboration, which I did. But my explanation, he said, “mystified” him. My Letter to Benoit Mandelbrot is a further meditation on music, self-similarity and cheating.

This Fall marks the twentieth season of provocative programming in New York City brought to you by Interpretations. Founded and curated by baritone Thomas Buckner in 1989, Interpretations focuses on the relationship between contemporary composers from both jazz and classical backgrounds and their interpreters, whether the composers themselves or performers who specialize in new music. To celebrate, Jerry Bowles has invited the artists involved in this season’s concerts to blog about their Interpretations experiences. Our first concert this season on 2 October, features the Myra Melford Quartet and Henry Threadgill’s Zooid + Talujon Percussion Ensemble. Michael Lipsey of Talujon has volunteered to write about how his group worked with the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust to commission a new work from Henry Threadgill:

Contemporary music is exciting. People are trying new things, creating new works, involving new audiences members. The division between genres is the most open it has ever been. With that in mind, Talujon Percussion, Henry Threadgill and Zooid have teamed up to play on the Interpretations Series in honor of the series’ 20th season.

Henry Threadgill is one of the most unique voices in contemporary improvisatory music. His resume is breath-taking, his skills are immense and his interests are wide and varied. About two years ago, Henry called me up a day before a Talujon concert. He told me he was interested in the group and wanted to come to our performance. We were happy to meet him and honored that he would come to one of our performances.

A few days after the performance, Henry again called and asked if we would be willing to work on a new work. The answer was, of course, “Yes”. Henry decided to write a piece for Talujon and his ensemble, Zooid. We ended up applying to the Mary Flagler Carey Trust for the commission. We have used that commissioning vehicle in the past. Through this organization we were also able to commission a work for 4 drum sets by Julia Wolfe.

After meeting with Henry, he decided to compose a piece for each individual in Talujon.
We all gave Henry our wishlist of instruments. Henry then used our strengths in his composition. The piece that came out of this process uses four of our members, each with our own set-up. The piece is called “Fate Cues”.

We start rehearsals tomorrow and we are all excited. If you listen to Henry’s works you find that he is a fluid composer. He is continually asking more from the players. The charts are difficult, but that is not the emphasis of his works. He wants the musicians to move through the piece together as a strict unit. Each voice in individually created but maintaining its own presence. The rehearsal process is key.

Talujon is a group that has 18 seasons of unity. We know each other and feel very comfortable with each other. Much like any ensemble, we can feel our musical relationships and know how to support one another. We like to experiment and have practiced improvisation many, many times. Jazz improvisation is different than what we are used to. First, we just need to get past feeling uncomfortable about improvising in front of these great jazz masters in Zooid. I think that part will be ok. All the members have been in these situations before and as a group; Talujon thrives on making the uncomfortable, comfortable.
We like challenges and Henry is open and excited about the challenge.

It should be fun

*****

Myra Melford Quartet: Happy Whistlings; Henry Threadgill’s Zooid + Talujon: Fate Cues

Thursday October 2, 2008, 8pm at Roulette.

more information / Interpretations

Our regular listen to and look at living, breathing composers and performers that you may not know yet, but I know you should… And can, right here and now, since they’re nice enough to offer so much good listening online:

Let’s go a little further east, via a couple netlabels (online labels that offer freely downloadable, full-length MP3 “CD”s, usually with accompanying notes and cover artwork) 

Nexsound (Ukraine) 

They’ll tell you: Nexsound has been dedicated to the unusual and experimental music, both acoustic and electronic, that could be of any style and trend released on CDs and MP3 files. The term that describes music released by Nexsound best is probably “environmental music”, and it is often like “indocile ambient”. Nexsound music envelops you, listening to it feels like immersing into the very special atmosphere that this music creates, and thus it is intended rather for private listening. We pay the very special attention to the package of CDs released, so they look and feel very nice.

From the year of 2003 we’re also responsible for organizing concerts in Ukraine. From May, 2005 Nexsound hosts international festival for electronic music and visual arts – Detali Zvuku. Founded in 2000 by Andrey Kiritchenko in 2000 in Kharkiv city, Ukraine, Nexsound is currently being operated by Dmytro Fedorenko (Kotra) as well.

Besides traditional “for-sale” CDs, there’s a whole section of MP3-only releases; for the modern classical folks I’d especially recommend To Escape, To Breathe, To Keep Silence, by the young composer Alla Zagaykevych.

Musica Excentrica (Moscow)

Like they say: Musica Excentrica is a netlabel, based in Moscow, Russia, producing selected avantgarde post-music in non-entertainment genres (acoustic as well as electronic). In general, we are making music distribution in the internet as online label.

Mainly electro and improv, this label also carries a compilation of pieces composed as tributes to the memory of Iannis Xenakis, as well as Polina Voronova’s Luxurious, awarded an “Honorary Mention” in the digital music category at the Prix Ars Electronica / International Competition for CyberArts 2007.